As I attempt to get this old brain into high gear and pull out memories
long ago backed-up to some far corner, I get snippets of events that rapidly
pop in and out. So, I must step back a bit and relate a couple if things
that recently emerged.

When thinking of Grandpa Newt and his matches I remembered that there
were two types of kitchen matches, one with white tips and one with blue.
Both were "strike anywhere" and I mean anywhere. I've seen matches
struck with a thumbnail while being held in the same hand, struck on teeth,
the bottom of a shoe, on a jacket zipper and naturally any rough surface
handy. Grandpa Newt, and many others, preferred the back of the leg. The
knee was lifted to bring the thigh to a horizontal position and the match
was dragged over the taut fabric from the base of the buttock to almost
the knee. It was a common sight to see a light colored line running down
the back of a man's dark trouser leg. However, this practice was put aside
when wearing one's best attire.

The
day the big truck parked in front of the house next door attracted the
attention of several male neighbors. I went with Dad to look at it and
remember the sides were painted with a big red stripe and a big blue round
thing with writing over it. Being somewhat new at reading I had to ask
dad what P-a-b-s-t spelled -- I could read the Blue Ribbon part. The man
with the truck lived next door and had gotten his old delivery job back.
He and several others ended up in our kitchen with a case of PBR, and
a box of cigars to celebrate his return to a steady job and the end of
Prohibition. Dad passed up the cigars and got out his seldom smoked and
highly prized meerschaum. In thinking about this event now, I realize
it must have been early spring of 1934 as the 21st Amendment was finally
ratified the previous December.

The highest priority of my dad during those hard years was the wellbeing
of his family. While many during the depression years relied on the government
to provide food and housing through various welfare programs my dad refused.
He would get watch repair work through word of mouth and he had several
jobs through what would eventually become the WPA (The Works Progress
Administration). The first was street paving. Many streets in those days
were paved with brick and dad, after years of sitting on his duff at a
watchmaker's bench, was hauling and laying brick. On his knees most of
the day and carrying hundreds of pounds of brick.

He and some of his co-workers were transported to and from the job site
in the back of a dump truck. Often I watched him haul himself over the
back of the truck to the street and wearily walk the few steps to the
front porch. He would plop from exhaustion on the top step and sag against
the banister post. Mom would bring him a cold drink and he would roll
himself a cigarette or light his pipe if he had a tin of Half and Half.
He later got a job sharpening scythes for workers preparing the land for
a government sponsored artificial Lake Springfield. This relieved him
of the heavy labor and provided the family with a supply of meat. There
were an abundance of Rabbits in the underbrush at the work site!

Linoleum was delivered with a long piece of bamboo through the middle
of the roll to facilitate carrying. Almost everyone had several bamboo
poles stashed away in cellars. It was during Grandpa Newt's last visit
that I decided I should have a pipe too. I made one by cutting a piece
of bamboo just below a joint and a couple of inches above the joint and
fitting it with a stem made from a Forsythia branch. Forsythia branches
have a soft membrane in the center that can be easily removed by pushing
a wire through the branch. Naturally I told everyone it was a bubble pipe
but did swipe some of Dad's Bull Durham and gave it a try. I don't know
whether it was the tobacco or the pipe but the result was a very upset
stomach and the end of my fascination with pipe smoking for a number of
years.

Ernie Whitenack was born in 1928 in Springfield,
Illinois and moved to Massachusetts in the mid 1930's. He is a Korean
War veteran, worked as a photographic illustrator for 43 years and is
now retired.